While Weld Central High School officials refute allegations of racism stemming from a recent football game, Greeley school officials appreciate their politically neutral mascots.

Weld Central’s strikingly Civil-war-era-soldier-looking Rebel mascot stoked some controversy last month, but over the weekend the Keenesburg-based school garnered widespread media attention in the wake of recent allegations of racism during a Friday football game in Denver. The principal of Denver’s Manual High School accused the Weld Central High School football team of using racial slurs during a game and displaying a Confederate flag. Weld Central officials deny the claims and cite a lack of evidence, according to a statement released Sunday.

The concerns have now spilled over to Greeley-Evans School District 6.

Some people, confused about Weld Central’s location and upset about the situation, contacted Greeley-Evans School District 6, said Theresa Myers, District 6 spokeswoman.

“We’re lucky in that we have apolitical mascots for the most part,” she said. “So we haven’t faced the mascot issues that other Weld County school districts have faced.”

Myers said she doesn’t know of any Confederate flag controversies in District 6 schools. Should issues like that arise in the district, officials would handle them on a case-by-case basis.

“We certainly try to always balance people’s freedom of speech with the utmost concern we have for kids feeling safe,” she said. “And if there was an act going on that was making students not feel safe or feel like they were being discriminated against, we would certainly deal with that. … We don’t want any student displaying anything that would feel like a threat to another student, that would include anything from a swastika to a Confederate flag.”

District 6 has anti-discrimination policies in place, however, Myers said she doesn’t believe District 6 has ever had a policy that specifically names Confederate flags.

“But then again, our mascots are not the rebels,” she said.

Over the weekend Weld Central officials condemned displays of racism in a prepared statement.

“We want to assure all of our community members and those communities we interact with that we do not tolerate racism of any form,” according to the statement. “The confederate flag and any other symbols of hate and racism play no role in our district.”

Denver public school officials have said in a statement they are reaching out to the Weld Central High School community to jointly discuss the events of Friday night’s football game in an effort to move forward in a collaborative spirit.

In August, when controversy raged across the country about Confederate war monuments, dueling petitions sprang up, one calling for school officials to change the Weld Central Rebels mascot and another calling on the district to keep the mascot as it is.

At that time, Greg Rabenhorst, Weld Central Re-3J School District superintendent, said Weld Central’s rebel mascot used to appear with depictions of Confederate flags, but the district removed the flags years ago. When the district formed in the early 1960s, the high school chose the rebel mascot, but officials never selected an official image or depiction of its mascot, Rabenhorst said. Weld Central Middle School also has a rebel as its mascot.

Rabenhorst said the district’s position maintains the rebel isn’t a sign of racism, hate or violence but one of school pride.